B (5:36)

Yeah. And I think, you know, it's important to note that, like, this is just. I think a lot of us have understood for a long time that there is a class of people that exist above accountability, that exists kind of above even, like the concept of the nation state, that there are. There are people out there who have so much wealth and so much power that they live in a totally different world than we do. And what the Epstein files are showing us is just how true that actually is and also just how depraved that level of power and wealth can make people. And it is. It's amazing that it is really kind of bringing in a lot of folks who in other issues don't agree with each other politically. But we are all beginning to realize, right left, Republican, Democrat, down here in the real world, we actually are just there to be exploited by a small group of people who in some ways are just kind of running the world for their own benefit. And the Epstein files show that in glaring fashion. And I think it's just the realization that we're all starting to wake up to this fact. And it is a. The only way that we're gonna move forward is by frankly building the political power to hold all these people accountable and make sure that that kind of wealth just doesn't get to be accrued anymore.

A (7:02)

There's the expression, the greatest trick the devil ever pulled was convincing the world that he didn't. One of the things that Donald Trump did effectively is fraud. And that's what he's been doing his whole life. He convinced the people of Maine and throughout the rest of the country that while this class may have existed out there, that he was the one who was going to get them and fight them and be the one who destroyed the deep state and took it all down, when, in fact, he's the leader of the cabal. In my opinion, he is the personification of the Epstein class. And everybody who surrounds him at the highest level are the top people, are the lieutenants in the Epstein class. And that has been just, I think, a revelation again across parties. But we're seeing that now. It's them. It's them who try to trick and convince and defraud people and say no, it's this other cabal out there. They're the center of the cabal.

B (8:04)

They absolutely are. I mean, when you look at the names, when you. When you look at the people who are now currently trying to run interference on this stuff, it's the Trump administration, it's the people in the Trump administration who currently are still frankly stealing from all of us. I mean, they just said that crypto summit down at Mar a Lago. I mean, the corruption is so brazen, but at the end of the day, I mean, I think it's so brazen because they truly feel like there will be no accountability. And that's why it's really important for us down here in the real world to build the political power necessary to make sure that there is accountability. We can't. When this is said and done, when normal people have power again, we can all just move on from this. We need to make sure that those who have engaged in this kind of behavior, whether it's the corruption or the. I can't believe I'm going to say these worlds, the international pedophile ring, those people need to be held to account and to the utmost ability that the law can do. And I think that we are. We are reaching a moment where that realization is beginning to dawn on all of us down here that it really is us versus them, and they've been winning for a long time, and it's time for us to build some power and start winning ourselves.

A (9:25)

Right? You had two summits kind of taking place around the same time. You had the Trump family crypto summit taking place in Florida. Then you had an AI summit taking place in India at the same time. Zooming in on both. But we'll just zoom in on the Trump crypto summit. The Trump kids said we had to do this. They were asked by CNBC about the levels of corruption there. And the host was like, you realize that people are doing deals with you because they want proximity to the White House and they want benefits. Well, we've been canceled, and this is what we have to do. And, and, and Daddy told us that we need to. You know, they did that. But what's fascinating, too, is when you go through the Epstein files, you see Epstein talking to these same types of people about getting Putin involved in crypto and launching it. And, you know, all of this behind the scenes was being kind of puppeteered. And now, you know, I guess if there's one benefit that all of this, it's in plain view, like we see it. The kids are saying, we're doing it, here's what we're doing. So what?

B (10:32)

Yeah, I mean, that's in the irony with the crypto stuff, too, is that that was sold to all that was sold to us as this, like, decentralized, democratized way that we were going to be able to use to have, like, new currency. And in reality, when you, I mean, both in the, in the Epstein files, but also elsewhere in reality, it was all just a money making scheme for those who already had plenty of money. I mean, it's just a way of essentially bilking people out of their actual wealth and investing it into these, into these mediums that are not at all what they were sold as, that are just ways of extracting wealth out of working people. Which, you know, shouldn't be that surprising because that's sort of what this class has been doing for a very long time. But the brazenness of it now, the fact they don't even hide it, I mean, it really is pretty wild, right?

A (11:29)

You know, on Friday, we got some really bad economic data as well. The GDP was less than half in the fourth quarter of what Trump regime people were saying it was going to be. And you had Lutnik saying, judge me by my fourth quarter GDP, it is going to be 5%. What was Trump saying, 15%? Okay, well, it was like 1.4%. And not that the GDP is necessarily, could even be necessarily extrapolated on how people are doing. But then you look at pce, how inflation's impacting consumers, that ticked up and came in hotter than expected. But to me, you look at the big one that we've been seeing, which is jobs, jobs, jobs, jobs. We are in a jobs recession right now. Manufacturing has been crippled, and Donald Trump's out there saying, $2,000, I'm going to give you rebate checks. You know, how are we going to deal with health insurance? 2,000. For Donald Trump, it is to tell people who are suffering, we're going to give you $2,000. And then he never actually even gives the money. But as though, as though you should be thankful when I just give you a $2,000 check and shut up. Right? That's what they're saying.

B (12:40)

I mean, this is really kind of the issue with, I would not, not just the Trump administration, but, but also often sort of Republican policies, which is that they claim that they're going to fix the kind of deeper economic problems that we have, but they can't, because those policies are being created to protect those who are benefiting off of the current system. I mean, like the idea that we're going to fix the health insurance issue not by going after health insurance companies, not by creating a universal healthcare system. And just divesting ourselves entirely from a profit based healthcare system. That's not how we're going to do it. No, we're just going to write people checks that then they'll have to go turn around and give to the same entities that have been exploding them the whole time. It's a, it's always this kind of bait and switch where they tell you that they're going to fix it. But when you. And this I guess for me is sort of the point of why this moment is so important, that we have a clear message about what the answers actually are. That we have kind of a. We re engage with political imagination around how to fix the systemic problems that we have something like a universal health care system, like changing the tax code to claw back all this wealth that has been stolen from working people in this country for decades. We need to re engage with that because it's the only way to actually fix the problem. And we know that we're going to have to do it because Republican policies will never actually fix it even when they claim that it will. We know that it's going to always benefit those who are benefiting now, which is not working people in this country. And it is just such a. It's so clear at this point. But I also think that's why we. And when I say we, I mean Democrats or progressives or even just at this point I would say like economic realists, we need to have obvious policy prescriptions for these problems because we cannot just allow this kind of limp along. And as the Republican Party continues to fail because their policies are not actually meant to fix these systemic issues, we need to be there ready to provide people the actual answer. And the actual answer is going after the Epstein class, going after the billionaires, going after the oligarchy and breaking their power.

A (15:16)

And that's what excites me about this moment. Because from the depths of depravity there is a real opportunity not just for Democrats to pick up seats or take control of the House. We what's the purpose of control if you don't do with control things that actually help the people? Sure, maga, Mike Johnson's the Speaker of the House, but he's got no power. He's just a Donald Trump sycophant. Why would you even want to be the speaker if that's what you do if you're just being, you know, in that world? So to me we've talked about Republicans, but let's end this by talking about Democrats because to me it's not just power for power's sake. Right. It is. What fundamentally is the Democratic Party? And to your point, setting aside the party, what. What are fundamentally we doing in governance generally? What does it mean to be a senator? What does it mean to be. Look, Fetterman ran a campaign where he made all these promises. I'm. This, this, this. I. I had him on. He did the Fetterman stick when he was back in the day, Mr. Progressive. He went in there and. And now I can see the guy on, you know, every night, Fox News every second. You know, he made his way. So that's not helpful to have, you know, someone, you know, doing, in my view, you know, so to me, talk to. Talk to that more generally about the opportunity that we have as a party to move in a certain direction, rather than just saying we need to seek power.

B (16:44)

Yeah. And it's. And it's not. And again, I don't actually think it is the party. I mean, it's a. I don't care who comes along with us. I don't care what the letter next to their name is. If we can put together a coalition of people who actually want to fight for systemic change, who want to fight for things like universal health care, who want to fight for things like amending the tax code so we can pull back all that wealth, who want to fight for large programs like we used to do, like what we did in the Great Depression, large public works programs, rebuilding our infrastructure, rebuilding our transportation, rebuilding our energy grid in a way that's going to get us off fossil fuels and provide energy for Americans. Not prioritizing corporate profits, but prioritizing getting people the energy they need to live good lives. That's what we need to be engaged in. And it's not just about get. If you get power for power's sake, you actually don't have any power, which I think is right now. What we are seeing in elements of the Democratic Party leadership, they have spent years just trying to get to a place of power, but with no plan of what they were going to do with it when they got there. And when you don't have a further goal, when you don't have the intent of using this power to do something, you find yourself to be utterly powerless. Which is why I think we see the inability of some in Democratic leadership to resist the Trump administration, because they don't have a theory of power, and they don't really have a theory of change. They don't really seem to know what they're building towards. We need to re engage both politically but also, I think, culturally with the concept of using our imaginations to envision a better future for all Americans. And I think the way that we do this in many ways is we get to look back. We get to look at the New Deal, we get to look at fdr, we get to look at things like the CCC or the Works Progress Administration. We get to look at the Tennessee Valley Authority or the Rural Electrification program. Mass, mass programs driven by political will and government intervention that laid the groundwork and the foundation of the society that we have today. The way of thinking that brought us Social Security and unemployment insurance laid the groundwork for things like Medicare and Medicaid. We have to re engage with that kind of imaginative thinking and understanding that the purpose of power, when we get it, is to wield it and bring about positive change for Americans. If we don't have that vision and we win again, I'll be very upfront. One of my fears is if establishment Democrats coast back to power this November on an anti Trump wave, but we elect people that have no interest in actually trying to make systemic change. I fear we might not get this chance again if we let the American people down one more time, if they give us power back and we do nothing. I'm worried about the next iteration of this. Donald Trump is terrible, but at least he's incompetent. I do fear what the next thing is, and I think the way that we guarantee that day never comes is we don't just try to go backwards to the society we had. We try to build a society that does not allow for this kind of immiseration of working people. That creates the resentment and the fear and the aggrievement. We give people the material benefits that they deserve in a society that is so productive and so wealthy that we can actually provide those things.

A (20:30)

Graham Platner Rarely am I left speechless with no further questions at the end. I won't concede whether or not I am right there. I'll just wrap it up by saying where can people learn more about the campaign?

B (20:42)

So gram4senate.com you can, we can absolutely use your help with small dollar donations, recurring monthly donations. We don't take corporate PAC money. We don't take APAC money. The vast majority of our donations are $200 or less. Our average donation is somewhere around like $27. We're very proud of that. We need your help. But also it's the volunteering side. We really are trying to build something here in Maine that is a different kind of politics. It's a politics built on organizing and built on people. And even if you're not in the state of Maine, you can't just come knock doors with us. We you can help out with phone banking, text banking. We have a ton of different volunteer opportunities and the whole point of that is to make politics accessible to people again. And we can use your help. So if you don't mind, go to grand4senate.com and donate or sign up to volunteer.

A (21:32)

Graham Platner. Appreciate you.

B (21:34)

Hey, thanks a lot, man. It's great being here.

A (21:36)

Everybody. Hit subscribe. Let's hit that 6 million this week. Want to stay plugged in? Become a subscriber to our substack@midasplus.com you'll get daily recaps from Ron Filipkowski ad free episodes of our podcast and more exclusive content Only available@midasplus.com. We're lost. I'm gonna pull over and ask that man for directions. Hi there. We're looking to get to the campground.

B (22:03)

Well, you're gonna take a left at the old oak tree end of this here road. No, I'm just kidding. Let me get my phone out.

A (22:09)

How are you getting a signal out here?

B (22:10)

T Mobile and US Cellular decided to merge. So the network out here is huge. We're getting the same great signal as the city and saving a boatload with all the benefits. Oh, and a five year price guarantee.

A (22:20)

Okay, here's those directions. Actually, can you point us in the direction of a T Mobile store? America's best network just got bigger. Switch to T Mobile today and get built in benefits the other guys leave out.

B (22:32)

Plus our five year price guarantee.

A (22:35)

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